The sculpture that shapes itself

Tuesday 22 September 2009 12:44 BST

Anish Kapoor outside the Royal Academy with his Tall Tree And The Eye tower of spheres

The largest work ever exhibited at the Royal Academy is unveiled today.

A vast 20-tonne block of red wax is squeezing slowly through a series of doorways across the breadth of the Piccadilly institution as part of the new exhibition by one of its most renowned artists, Anish Kapoor.

It is the first time Kapoor, 55, has shown in the UK the monumental work Svayambh (2007) — from the Sanskrit meaning "self-generated".

The sculpture gets its shape from doorways it squeezes through, and leaves residue behind. The artist said: "It's as if the building is giving birth,"

In another room, a different explosion of red is being created as a cannon fires wax at regular intervals in a work entitled Shooting Into The Corner. The build-up of wax takes its own form on the walls and floor.

"It's a ritual space in which this rather terrifying thing takes place," Kapoor said. "It's as if the red is almost asking to be read as body meat."

The exhibition includes early sculptures, mirror-polished stainless-steel works that distort and invert the viewer and, outside in the Academy courtyard, a giant new tower of glittering spheres, called Tall Tree And The Eye.

Kapoor, who was born in India but came to London as a student and stayed, said that the exhibition could not include hundreds of works because he worked on such a large scale.

He is the first living artist to be given a major solo show in the RA, where he is one of the elected Academicians. Henry Moore should have enjoyed such an honour in 1988, but died before his exhibition opened.

The Academy funds the showing of the work but not the making of the new pieces. "I've been lucky enough over the years to have a reasonably healthy market," said Kapoor.

Anish Kapoor, supported by Richard Chang, opens to the public on Saturday and runs until 11 December. Full price admission £12.